Bill Clark/Roll Call/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- An outspoken and often controversial Democratic congressman drew a rebuke from a fellow Democrat on Wednesday for comparing the Tea Party to the KKK.

Rep. Steve Israel, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said he disagrees with Rep. Alan Grayson’s recent comments about the Tea Party.

“I disagree. I disagree with Alan’s remarks,” Israel told ABC News.

Grayson’s 2014 re-election campaign sent out a fundraising e-mail Monday titled, “The Tea Party: No More Popular Than The Klan.”

The e-mail included a graphic image of two Klansmen standing near a giant burning cross. The burning cross is used to help spell Tea Party. Clicking on the image takes viewers directly to an ActBlue webpage, where they can donate to the Florida congressman’s 2014 re-election campaign.

The National Republican Congressional Committee condemned Grayson for his remarks and called on the DCCC to do the same.

“There’s no excuse for the hateful words and imagery used by Congressman Grayson,” NRCC spokesman Matt Gorman said in a statement. “House Democrats should swiftly and strongly condemn him and return the money he has raised for them. This hate-filled rhetoric has Americans fed up with Washington.”

Israel dismissed the NRCC’s attacks, saying its “not surprising that the NRCC would plug away” at this.

He added, “The NRCC should probably have spent more time trying to figure out how not to default on our economy, and open up the government, but I disagree with Congressman Grayson’s remarks.”

Israel did not respond to the NRCC’s call to donate Gray’s campaign contributions to charity.